With all award ceremonies, the intention is for a group of peers to come together and crown the best of their particular field. However, this always becomes a pretext for narratives that can get grafted onto the categories and nominations, and at the 54th Golden Horse Awards being held this Sunday in Taipei, all the discussion is focused on Takeshi Kaneshiro.

The Chinese-Japanese actor began his career in 1993 with a role in the Johnnie To co-directed wuxia sequel "The Heroic Trio 2: Executioners" but quickly rose to prominence with back-to-back roles in Wong Kar-wai’s "Chungking Express" and Fallen Angels and the lead in Corey Yuen’s 1997 "Boxer From Shantung" remake, "Hero". In the 2000s, he starred in Zhang Yimou’s "House of Flying Daggers", Andrew Lau and Alan Mak’s "Confession of Pain" – their follow-up to the "Infernal Affairs" series – worked alongside Donnie Yen in the critically acclaimed martial arts noir "Dragon" and was a lead in both of John Woo’s historical epics, "Red Cliff" and "The Crossing".

And only now is he receiving his first Best Actor nomination, but in a bizarre twist, it’s for his performance as Guan Chun, in "See You Tomorrow", a frenetic and critically panned romantic comedy produced and written (but not directed) by Wong Kar-wai – many critics cite this as the reason for the film’s failure: The film swept China’s Youth Film handbook’s 8th Golden Broom Awards – winning Most Disappointing Film, Most Disappointing New Director and Most Disappointing Screen Writer – and writing for Variety, critic Maggie Lee said of the film that “overkill feels like an understatement” and that it’s “lacking any of the auteur’s usual finesse.”

While the nomination feels a little like a “lifetime achievement award”, which is a touch preemptive considering Kaneshiro is only 44, if he wins, it will feel very much in line with Jeff Bridges winning Best Actor at the 82nd Academy Awards for "Crazy Heart" after a whole career of performances that went without nomination (although he did have one prior Best Actor nomination for John Carpenter’s "Starman" in 1984 compared to Takeshi Kaneshiro’s prior Golden Horse Award success, which was for Best Original Song in 2006.)

For an actor of his status, with a thriving international movie career and a string of major endorsements, the actual importance of the award to either himself or his career is likely to be limited, however the Golden Horse Awards are most famous on the international stage for their commitment to honoring acting excellence. Fellow Wong Kar-wai luminaries Tony Leung and Maggie Cheung have won a combined seven Best Actor/Actress awards from a total of 11 nominations.

Another narrative that has recently sprung up in light of the ongoing fallout from the Harvey Weinstein scandal, which is currently engulfing the American entertainment business, is that the Golden Horse Awards are honoring three female fronted projects in the Best Feature category, including two films helmed by female directors: "Love Education" is a romantic drama starring and directed by Sylvia Chang and "Angels Wear White", directed by Vivian Qu, has already earned plaudits from the Venice Film Festival for its treatment of sexual abuse in China. 

Also, though directed by a man, "The Bold, The Corrupt, and The Beautiful" is a period crime drama with an entirely female principal cast. American actress Jessica Chastain is also expected to present an award. 

Elsewhere, "The Great Buddha +", which won the Grand Prize at the 19th Taipei Film Awards, leads the pack with 10 nominations, including best Feature Film and Best Cinematography. The comedy-drama is Huang Hsin-yao’s directorial debut – the “+” in the title signifies the film is an extension of "The Great Buddha" short he made on an iPhone – and is about two low level blue collar workers who discover their wealthy boss is having an affair.

The 54th Golden Horse will take place on November 25, 2017.